Summary
What the Brits can teach Americans about libel law
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TRUTH, TERROR, AND DAVID TRIMBLE.
Is the Nobel Peace Prize winner complicit in murder? What the Brits can teach Americans about libel law.
You have just won the Nobel Peace Prize. You are a very important person. But before your ego can deflate and you can start spending the prize money, some journalist writes a book accusing you of complicity in the government-sanctioned murder of innocent people. What to do? If you're Henry Kissinger, you shrug your shoulders, denounce the accusations as absurd, and go about your business of preserving Soviet-American hegemony until Ronald Reagan can become president. If you're David Trimble, the first minister of the yet-to-be-formed coalition government in Northern Ireland, the head of its largest Protestant party, and the co-recipient of the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize, you adjust your orange sash, denounce the charges as absurd, and - because you still live in the United Kingdom - sue or threaten to sue everyone in sight for libel, including the publisher, the journalist, and any U.S.-based online bookseller who dares offer the book for sale in the U.K. Does this mean David Trimble is more thin-skinned than Henry Kissinger? Not exactly. It simply means that, in the name of the First Amendment, the libel regime in the U.S. actively discourages public figures...See the full content of this document
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